A security video showing what happened in the marijuana dispensary a day after the slain El Camino College student disappeared was presented in court on Feb. 13.
LAPD Robbery and Homicide Detective Jennifer Hammer described to the jury what she and other LAPD detectives saw when they first inspected the digital video recording.
The video was then projected onto the court’s large TV screen.
With a timestamp starting at 6:30:50 a.m. on Sept. 23, 2020, three figures appear in the VIP Collective LA dispensary behind the counter where Hernandez worked.
It was the same area where images shown earlier in the trial depicted accused Ethan Astaphan on top of Hernandez while Weijia Peng looks on.
In the video, Peng is seen taking items from the top of a small table and putting them into a plastic trash bag.
Astaphan and a woman in a baseball cap, jacket, jeans and sneakers, are wearing disposable gloves and using dry paper towels to wipe up the floor.
The woman picks up a pair of glasses from the floor and drops them into the same bag where Peng put the other items. They dispose of the paper towels in a separate trash bag.
“I believe those were Juan’s wallet and glasses,” Hammer said regarding the items collected from the shop.
The woman was later identified as Sonita Heng with the FBI’s help.
The FBI discovered Heng’s identity because a detective on the Hernandez homicide case serves on joint LAPD-FBI investigations, Hammer told The Union.
Hammer submitted search warrant requests for Astaphan’s, Peng’s and Heng’s cell phone records.
The LAPD asked the FBI to monitor Peng’s and Astaphan’s movements.
Soon after, the FBI alerted the LAPD about a woman leaving the U.S. with Peng.
“Peng purchased two plane tickets to Turkey, and one of those tickets was for Sonita Heng,” Hammer said.
LAPD forensic detective Sean Hanson tracked the cellphone of Hernandez, Peng, Astaphan and Heng on Sept. 22 and 23, 2020.
On the afternoon of Feb. 13, Hammer testified on the results of Hanson’s investigation.
Hammer said using cell phone towers or “sites,” Hanson determined the phones’ locations at specific times.
Hernandez’s phone was in the vicinity of the VIP dispensary in South Central Los Angeles throughout the evening of Sept. 22, 2020.
Peng’s, Astaphan’s and Heng’s phones were in the area of the apartment Peng and Heng shared in Alhambra from 9:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. on Sept. 22, 2020.
The three phones then moved west on the 10 Freeway and arrived at 10:56 p.m. in the area of the VIP dispensary where they remained until 11:37 p.m.
The trio’s phones then proceeded to move on the Interstate 15 North, they arrived at 2:12 a.m. on the early morning of Sept. 23, 2020 in the area of Afton Road, an isolated section of the Mojave Desert.
The phones remained in that area for more than an hour.
By 3:30 a.m., the phones traveled back toward L.A. County on Interstate 15 South, arriving at 5:35 a.m. near Astaphan’s apartment in San Gabriel then back to the dispensary at 6:01 a.m.
The video recovered from the DVR shows Peng, Astaphan and Heng cleaning the dispensary floor shortly after.
On the morning of Feb. 14, Hammer described miles of harsh desert that separated two cell towers where the phones had registered.
On the court’s TV screen, jurors saw a map of the Mojave Desert’s Afton Road exit off I-15 along with photos of the areas that the LAPD and San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department searched.
Different teams returned to the area on at least five days, each time working from early morning until sunset.
Hammer described the terrain as “rugged” with dirt roads carved through the desert made up of dirt, soft sand and rocks.
Each time they went to search, “several cars got stuck,” Hammer said. “We had to help each other” to get the vehicles out.
At first, Hanson only had the movements of Heng’s phone. As he added data from Peng’s and Astaphan’s cell service, he was able to narrow the area. On his visit on Nov. 14, 2020, he felt he was close to determining the exact location to search.
On Nov. 15, 2020, they returned with several San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department volunteer canine handlers and trained cadaver dogs. Hammer testified that one of the teams found a body dumped off Afton Road approximately 2.5 miles from I-15.
In a photo marked “People’s Number 72” the courtroom saw the skeletal remains of a backbone and ribs. The lower half of the body is mostly missing.
The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department Coroner Division was contacted to investigate the scene and take possession of the body. The remains were tagged “Coroner’s Case Number 702009350.
By the next day, the remains were identified through fingerprinting as Hernandez.
Next: text messages between the two men accused of killing Hernandez reveals possible motive and a forensics expert helps recover footage from security videos.
